Portal to the past
by kaworu
Summary: Kenshin finds out that a mysterious orb can enable him to return to the past. His fight with Enishi is apporaching, and he is haunted with regret for Tomoe...what will he do?


Read and review, onegai.. ^_^ 

Standard disclaimers apply.

The warm, gentle night wind caressed Kaoru's face as she stood at the doorway of her dojo. Around her, fireflies glowed in green beams of light; above, a canopy of stars twinkled down benignly. So quiet, so peaceful…..why, then, was she filled with a sense of dread, as that of the calm before the storm?  

The sound of someone snoring softly in the room nearby reached her ears. So at least Kenshin was able to sleep, even with the thought of facing Enishi the next morning. _Kenshin……_  Kaoru felt her heart moved with compassion and admiration for  the man ; for the great burden he bore, the hurt and conflict deep within him, and his strength in  facing it. 

She turned around, intending to get some sleep, as difficult as it was tonight. Suddenly, there was a soft thump, as if someone had dropped something onto the grass, and then a tinkling noise, barely audible but melodious and clear. Feeling rather afraid, she spun around to find out what….or perhaps who? …it was. Her eyes grew wide..

"Get a grip, Kaoru…..your lack of sleep's getting to you…..you're seeing things.." she muttered to herself, rubbing her eyes. But when she opened them, of course, it was still there. A brilliant orb about the size of  a lantern, glowing from within with an incandescence of rainbow colors. There seemed to be something moving in it… streaks of colours swirling about like the waters of a fountain. The tinkling noise grew louder,  captivating but yet mysterious….and even frightening. 

It was only then that Kaoru noticed the figure of a person by a bush near the object. It hovered for a while, then slipped away before she could do anything. _Strange…very strange……_ She moved cautiously towards it, wondering what blessing or evil it held, her eyes drawn towards the ever-changing mist of colours in it. Nearer and nearer….she could see more clearly now…..the colours turned into distorted, ever-changing shapes of people and places….she moved faster and more eagerly…..she could reach out, touch them, be a part of them…..

"Kaoru-dono!" A strong hand held her arm firmly. She started and looked around, feeling as if she had just woken up from a dream. The red-haired rurouni stood over her in a sleeping robe, his countenance troubled. 

"Kenshin! Uh…what…are you doing here?" 

"I was about to ask you the same thing, Kaoru-dono," he said, quietly. "What is that thing you were going to touch?"

"I…..don't know…"  She felt confused, and indeed began to wonder what she was doing in the garden in the middle of the night next to a shiny ball with Kenshin holding her arm.

His expression changed to one of concern. "Never mind….are you okay?"

She slowly got to her feet, shaking ever so slightly. "Uh…yeah…I think so…"

 "Maybe you should get some sleep." Kenshin guided her by the arm back to her room, noticing that her whole body was trembling, but he didn't say a word. Then he strode back out to the garden, his brow furrowing with thought. This …thing….it was weird, but he could feel a sort of ki emanating from it. Of course ki were supposed to be life forces that could only be channelled by warriors…and that would mean that this …thing….was alive? It seemed to be calling to him, compelling him to reach out and touch it, and he had to counter it with his own ki to resist its calling. It had probably done the same to Kaoru. Poor girl, she almost looked as if she had been hypnotized.

"Who are you?" he spoke aloud.

_Your past_…..He felt rather than heard those words…..it was as if that thing was speaking straight to his mind, rather than to his external ears.

He looked into its depths, saw the swirling images of people in them……..kami-sama, some of them even seemed recognizable…"My memories?"

No…memories are but shadows of what has happened, assembled by your mind. I am the past in itself, in reality, in living flesh and blood.

"How can it be living? The past has already come and gone….my only thought is for the present."

Come and gone?? Not necessary, not necessary. The past is still here, still within me…

"You mean you are the link to the past?"

_No indeed. I _ am _the past …touch me, and you will find out…_

Kenshin felt its ki getting stronger, and adjusted his accordingly. "Someone who touches you can be transported back into the…living past? And ….live in it…and change it?"

Live in it…indeed. As for changing it…that depends…Now, won't you? Come into me…come in… Come… 

Kenshin turned quickly and went towards the dojo; he needed to think without the disturbing presence of the orb in his mind. As he faced the door of the dojo, he promptly realized that his part of the dialogue had been rather loud. Kaoru, Sano, Megumi, and Yahiko all stood just inside the door, staring at him. Thankfully Kaoru had regained the presence of mind to warn them not to approach the orb, he thought.

"Kenshin, what the heck was that?" Sano demanded.

Kenshin looked at all their faces and saw worry mingled with curiosity . Better to tell them than to risk them going out themselves to investigate, as he was sure they would if he withheld his information. "Sugoii!" Yahiko burst out, after he finished narrating his experience. "You mean it can really take you back into the past…..just by touching it?"

"Yahiko, that thing's dangerous!!" Kaoru yelled. "Don't be a smart alec and try anything with it…..it can play tricks with people's minds…honest…it did that to mine.."

"Well, busu, just because YOU have such feeble control over your mind and ki doesn't mean that— "

"Now wait a minute you ---- "

"Yahiko."

Kenshin's tone of voice and manner were so serious that it even chilled the high-spirited Yahiko. "Kaoru-dono's right: that thing IS dangerous. In fact, I don't think any of you, including Kaoru-dono, realize how truly dangerous it is. If any of you were to have anything to do with it, and if anything happens….it'll be my sole responsibility for telling you about it. Please, I must ask all of you to promise me not to have anything to do with it."

"Kenshin….how are we going to destroy it, though? I mean, if it's so dangerous…" Megumi asked.

Kenshin heaved a sigh. All the time, even while he had been speaking to them, a thought had been going round and round in his mind. A chance to return to the past, to possibly change it…..there was indeed something he had done that he regretted, more than anything. And now he might actually be able to do something, to put things right, to undo that terrible incident of eleven years ago that had haunted him ever since. And perhaps…Enishi wouldn't have to…

"I think…we need not….destroy it…." He said slowly.

Large hands grabbed his shoulders and brown eyes glared level with his. "You tell us all about how terribly dangerous it is and now you want to use it? Yes, I know that's what you intend to do; you can't fool me that easily! Kuso, Kenshin, if you ever do something stupid like that, for ANY reason whatsoever, I swear I'll………"

Kenshin forced himself to smile at Sano. "Relax, Sano. I won't be doing anything like that. Hmm,  don't you people need your sleep? There won't be much of the night left soon."

Four pairs of eyes glared at him suspiciously. Kenshin sweatdropped. "Trust me, guys…"

One by one, they returned to their rooms, but Kaoru pressed his hand before entering hers. "Kenshin, I may not say it often, but….I'm worried…about you….and there's so much trouble now, with Enishi and all that….please don't……"

"There's no need for worries, Kaoru-dono." He gave her what he hoped was reassuring smile, although he felt far from assured himself. "Oyasumi…"

"Oyasumi." Kaoru smiled back , then went into her room.

_So innocent, so brave, so kind.._ Kenshin looked at her retreating back with a sort of ache in his heart. _I want to protect her, to protect her happiness…to fulfill every failed promise I made to Tomoe…_

_Tomoe.. _The name brought him back to his thoughts about the orb. He had done the unforgivable to her….he had taken away her first happiness, and then taken away her life. The agonizing memory of killing the woman he had loved most in his life filled his thoughts for days, months and years, bringing a sense of shame and guilt deeper than anything he had ever known. But now, perhaps he could change everything…..The orb offered a second chance to make right his mistakes, to change the past that had so tormented his life. 

But his mind was suddenly filled with the thought of  the people in the dojo . Kaoru, Sano, Yahiko, Megumi…. Hadn't he vowed  to live in the present, not  dwell in the past? Hadn't he vowed to protect the happiness he now saw before him, not fret over shadows of remembrances? There was no telling how long he would be gone in the present time if he entered the orb…in fact , there was no guarantee that he would actually return. And they needed him tomorrow, when Enishi would come to assault the dojo.

_But, _he thought, _had I not killed Tomoe, Enishi wouldn't be like this in the first place. He wouldn't have grown up as a street orphan and leader of a weapon-trade…he would have had a sister to love him and care for him. It was I ..I who took all that away from him. _

_But it doesn't have to happen that way. I can now finally make it right...._

"Kaoru," he whispered. "Gomen ne. I know you'll worry if you find me gone……but I'll come back, as soon as I can."

He stepped outside for the second time that night. The night was silent and dark, the sky frosted over with the pale gleam of stars. And at the far end of the garden, the orb sat, a brilliant display of light illuminating the darkness about it. Kenshin took a deep breath and strode determinedly over towards it.

Sorry, my knowledge of RK and Japanese is a little rusty…pls do infrom me if u notice any errors! Oh…and do review and tell me what u think ……yeah I know this is the 2nd time I'm saying that.,..eheheheheh…

Btw would anyone be good enuf to tell me what a kimono used for sleeping is called in Japanese?? I plain forgot… -_-"


End file.
